Earlier today, Sturgill Simpson criticized the Academy of Country Music for coming up with an award based on the late musical legend Merle Haggard, which was later on given to Miranda Lambert. After sharing the post, Simpson admitted that he is aware of the repercussions of his actions.
Simpson made his initial statements on Facebook just before it was announced that Lambert had been chosen as the recipient of the Merle Haggard Spirit Award at the ACM Honors. In his first post, the country singer blasted the ACM for exploiting the name of Haggard, who died in April this year.
Through a lengthy post, Simpson criticized the country music personalities in Nashville's Music Row area for taking advantage of the legacy of the music icon.
"I'm writing this because I want to go on record and say I find it utterly disgusting the way everybody on Music Row is coming up with any reason they can to hitch their wagon to his name while knowing full and damn well what he thought about them," he posted.
Shortly after posting his rant, the ACM revealed Lambert to be the recipient of the award, according to Rolling Stone. This prompted Simpson to edit his original post to include an updated note explaining that he was not targeting Lambert in his rant. He also said that Lambert would probably agree with him regarding his views on the Merle Haggard Spirit Award.
Simpson then wrote that his career as a professional country musician will probably get affected by what he posted.
"I fully realize that as I type this, meetings and conversations are taking place on Music Row to ensure I am blackballed from the industry and that's perfectly fine with me," he said. "I'm not sure how you can blackball somebody you don't acknowledge in the first place anyway."
Simpson ended his post by wishing that Haggard was still alive so that he could give his thoughts on the issue.
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